


you're my angle, you're my angel

by orphan_account



Series: It's you my favorite [1]
Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Fluff, M/M, Mathematics, Time Skips, What Have I Done, a hell lotta them, angles and degrees, but thought it would be cool to use some, i actually do not know math, idk anymore, im too young to be doing this, one shot kinda not, this is a mess
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-21
Updated: 2019-06-21
Packaged: 2020-05-16 00:40:37
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19307134
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: The first time Jeno tells Jaemin he’s his angle, he means it, as in with a straight face and furrowed brows.That was when they were both in kindergarten, where the teacher beside them laughed and asked if he meant angel. Stubborn as he is, the then 5 year old refused to say otherwise, claiming that was exactly what he meant.12 years later, the statement still stands as much as when he offered it.(Aka: Jeno and Jaemin were friends in kindergarten. After almost a decade of not talking and being in different schools, they get back together for the better, along with a lot of angles, curves and mathematical expressions.)





	you're my angle, you're my angel

**Author's Note:**

> Heyyyy so I kind of got this idea because I saw a typo of someone referring to angel as angle and it was hella awkward so why not add a twist to it and make it sound like a good thing?  
> And I finally started using this account after like 2 months because my exams passed yay  
> I don't have any extensive knowledge on the American school system. I'm from the same city that one of the NCT members grew up in ;) which means English is not my first language, I know a lot of people who use this excuse but I'm still in school and I forced myself to write twice the amount of words I usually do in a single day.

The first time Jeno tells Jaemin he’s his angle, he means it, as in with a straight face and furrowed brows.

That was when they were both in kindergarten, where the teacher beside them laughed and asked if he meant angel. Stubborn as he is, the then 5 year old refused to say otherwise, claiming that was exactly what he meant.

12 years later, the statement still stands as much as when he offered it. 

 

Angel and angle. Angle and angel.

English is an interesting language. A math major is almost destined to not understand anything about it. There are 26 letters in the English alphabet, and words can vary from a single to 45 words not including diseases and chemical compounds that never fails to give Jeno headaches. Which means that the odds of two five-worded nouns with a completely same spelling is quite small, no bigger than a grain of sand in the whole universe, too.

Jeno likes to think that it’s him and Jaemin.

Angles are no less interesting than English. There’s the smallest unit angle, 1°. 1 out of 360. The start of everything, the start of nothing, with no guarantees of the future- will it stop at 3°? 65°? 224°? There’s a kind of uncertainty to it, the thrill of unknown. But they were too young at that time. Too young to remember the world map, too young to remember equations and formulas and the only thing that they’re capable of is 1+1=2s. Too young to even understand the concept of that, but it already felt right. Correct. Jeno still remembers how the boy looked on their first day of meeting, dark brown hair ruffled up a bit, a little lost of their first day in the big, big place with the ‘grown up kids’. How their mothers cooed in unison when Jeno walked up to him, offering the younger with one of his infamous eye smiles, and the boy accepted his hand and offer of going to class together.

45° is half of a right angle, half of a quarter. An eighth of a puzzle. How easily Jeno could divide it if he wanted: one part for himself, two for his parents, one for his older sister Sooyoung, one for Mark, one for Hyuck, one for Renjun and the last for Jaemin. Or should he say, waiting for Jaemin. The boy exited his life just as easily he has entered, and though it has been 8 years since he did that, Jeno still wished he would come back and share the afternoons like they did in the past. And he didn’t try to befriend Jeno again when they meet in high school, so by the laws of friendship, he didn’t force anything other than muttered greetings in the hallway either. It would be a lie to say that it doesn’t sting when Jaemin sits with his group of popular friends, or when he hears him laugh along some stupid joke they make, but Jeno is not going to take action for something that isn’t a problem at first. Not that he owns him or what. 45° is the longing, the reminiscent of fragments of a friendship that he would gladly hang to.

90° is a single right angle. The right angle that consists of 90 first meetings, and 10 years of wanting to rekindle what was once a beautiful and pure link of two blanks. 90° is knowing Jaemin again, his doe eyes and charming smile and deep voice. One fourth of his heart. It’s when a certain someone is imprinted on that corner, edged into it, not significant enough to say that the younger took his heart, but a noticeable depression when forcibly ripped away. 90° is the start, but also an end to something he never knew that will exist or existed, the sparks of a beautiful future. The second time Jaemin added himself to a part of Jeno’s life, as smooth as the first time he did so, adding a few more details here and there Jeno never noticed when they were young. Maybe he did, but they were all small things that one can only know through constant awareness and staring.

When Jeno chose his subjects, he already knew that he wanted to do extra math. Learning about the possibilities and numbers and logics were more of his thing. He’s heard it more than once that love does not have an equation, or a proof, but Jeno begged to differ. To him, love was something akin to a Bell Curve. Falling hard and deep until you think that there is no point of return, just to fall out of it for the same speed. Maybe there would be a point nearing the medium where everything just stays the same, but the curve will always get back up. It’s what he experienced with Renjun, whom he dated for 4 days before both of them decided they were simply better off as friends, and luckily did not break apart the small but tight friend group.

(“Hey, Jen, don’t take this wrong, but I like us better off as friends.” Renjun told Jeno in front of their lunch table, having finished a class together.”

Jeno shrugged. The crush, that could barely be classified as one, started about 3 days. For this so called love, thinking back, Jeno would most likely call it boredom or attraction. “Great, dude. Same.” He knows that it’ll take himself about one afternoon, give or take, to step out the remains of his feelings.

Renjun visibly relaxes. “I see the looks you send Lucas, by the way. I’m not blind.” Jeno adds as an afterthought.

The smaller one scowls and proceeds to hit him until he sees Lucas entering, before changing into an innocent and sweet expression reserved for one wide-eyed boy, eyes clouded with something that can only be considered as affection and interest.

Jeno, for some reason, never thought that he could get over a person any faster.)

180° is the half of a whole. Jeno finally, finally succumbs to what he’s been trying to cover up. He can’t believe that he’s still on the medium of the curve, the half of a whole circle, for a whole year. Just because of Na Jaemin, who didn’t even know that he’s the whole other part of him, the other half of his curve, the other half of his whole. He gives in to the desires, to what he knows that he wants, to be teased by his friends. He wants to end this because he knows it won’t end up the way he hoped for; but at the same time, Jaemin just keeps giving him false hope just to extinguish it a moment later. Yet, he can’t help agreeing to the parties and sleepovers that Jaemin invites him to. Every time he thinks that the medium cannot go even higher and he’s reached the tip of the curve, Jaemin proves him wrong, and pushes it just a little more over. 180° is the point of no return, the perfect half, all sweet and comfort and balanced. One step more or less, and you’re in a whole different boundary. 180° defies the odds and lines the different worlds clearly.

270° is the pain that comes along with it. From the start, the 1° that has grown to a solid three quarters, looking back at a time when he struggled to fill just one. 270° is the wanting, the thirst, that comes along with knowing what you wanted is close and reachable. He’s still not sure, but judging from what the people say and how the younger behaves, he is a solid 75% sure that Jaemin wouldn’t push him away if he actually closes the distance between them. 270° crying over the feeling of lost, and the 25% of doubt that wears down the 75% so much. 270° is waiting for the unknown, waiting for something to actually happen, waiting for release and what he bottled up for almost 2 years. 270° is planning on confessing but seeing Jaemin entertaining someone else. 270° is the doubt, and heartache, and things that slowly breaks him apart, so far yet so close.

And 360°, the whole full angle, is when he actually lets it take over him. Lets it overwhelm and wash him away. 360° is the moment he leans down, ignores the 90° of uncertainty, and the way he feels the smile and tears on Jaemin’s face against his own, and feeling the last quarter fading into the angle, where it comes together to fit perfectly without any blemishes. 360° is also the way they move in together, and how Jaemin wears his sweaters without asking first, looking irresistible and urging Jeno to hold him. 360° is perfect and complete, the Cinderella ending to their angle, a final stroke to the painting he’s working on, the final brush of ruby reds and vibrant blues and dazzling yellow. 360° is how Jaemin licks into his mouth, familiar and tender, smiling into their kisses, pressing chaste ones whether it be in public or private. 360° is waking up to a ball of warmth, Eskimo kisses, or stares so deep he wants to kiss the attention away from him. 360° is controlling their temper for the sake for each other, taking a step back to see things more logically, learning to put things down not only to please your other, but for your whole angle. 360° is the ending and the start, the countless possibilities that may happen onwards, the future that you know will be shared with a certain someone that rounds up your angle.

360° is made up of hundreds of combinations. There are times where Jeno feels 144° when they’re out for a simple ice cream date, dribbling down their chin like it used to when they were in kindergarten. Sometimes it’s a 297° when Jeno is trying to cram all the formulas into his brain before a test that counts 15% his grade, and Jaemin makes him fried egg rice with soup and puts stickies on the Tupperware. There are times that are at 55°, when Jeno gets hit on by a stranger in the club, and Jaemin glares at the guy while slinking a hand over his boyfriend suggestively; or when Jaemin gets harassed by a bunch of people and Jeno lets him cry all over his prized sweatshirt while swearing revenge. There’s 314°, where Jaemin licks the shell of Jeno’s ear as a form of teasing the boy. Or when Jaemin stares at him innocently while Jeno screams and throws away his phone due to a picture of a cockroach on his wallpaper (there’s only two people who has his password, go figure). But those moments never change, for a fact that they are a whole angle and angles are made up of different degrees.

Maybe they’re right after all, Jeno thinks, putting down what he thinks and considering the others like how Jaemin taught him. Maybe love is not something that has a logic behind it, a solvable problem, something they can put together and piece everything. Love is more like an expression, a non-syntax, that is not well-formed or have a clear order of operations: no proof, all on a vote of faith, with no need for explanations and reasons. Love is not a parabola, instead an irregular curve, one that goes higher and higher in the whole. Love is a chart, a line graph, of how much he loves him, but unpredictable and unable to determine for the next day. Love is not a sequence, not a formula. Maybe love isn’t even an angle, not representable by a degree, and it’s useless to try finding the suitable formula for love. But nobody has ever said that you need to have wings to be an angel, so neither Jeno nor Jaemin really care.

Most people might use angels as a form, a word of endearment. Jeno still prefers angle, because he is that stubborn, and some things really do stick with you.

(“What am I to you?” Jaemin asks on a day, a 277°.

“What are you to me? Aren’t we boyfriends?” Jeno redirects to question back to him.

“No, Jesus, I mean, the sappy way. I think I deserve it. Why can’t you be romantic for once?”

Jeno sighs. He knows that this won’t be the last time they’re having a conversation like this, but still goes along anyway. “Na Jaemin, the love of my life, my star, my angel. The one that perfects my angle, the man of my dreams, the person that I choose to grow old with, and I’m so, so happy to be this honoured.” He didn’t know when and why his tone grew warmer and brighter with words he meant with his whole heart. Seeing the small, satisfied smile on Jaemin, he settles a small kiss on the tip of his nose.

“You’re my angle, you’re my angel.” He whispers, barely loud enough.

And so he echos. “You’re my angle, you’re my angel.”)

**Author's Note:**

> brain.exe is not working after 3 hours of continuous writing.  
> cheers, ac


End file.
